333 slides of info

What just happened? It’s that time of year again when venture capitalist Mary Meeker reveals her annual Internet Trends report. The 333 slides cover a wide range of areas, including internet user growth, smartphone shipments, ad spending, and much more.

The first item covered in the report looks at how much web use is growing. There were 3.8 billion internet users, or 51 percent of the world, last year, an increase from 3.6 billion in 2017. Growth did slow to 6 percent, down from 12 percent in 2016, but that’s mostly because so much of the world’s population is already online. China still accounts for most internet users (21 percent), followed by India (12 percent) then the US (8 percent).

It’s a similar story in the smartphone market, which we’ve known has been stagnant for some time. Shipments and yearly growth fell last year due to so many people already owning handsets. The fact that many consumers aren’t upgrading to the latest flagships as quickly as they once did likely had an effect, too.

Internet ad spending increased 22 percent last year, with Google and Facebook taking the largest slices of the pie, though other big names, including Amazon and Twitter, are seeing their shares increase.

Americans now spend 6.3 hours a day on digital media, and over a quarter of US adults say they’re “almost constantly online.” This aligns with a recent survey that found Americans spend more time on mobile devices than watching TV.

The number of gamers is also on the increase, growing 6 percent to 2.4 billion, while the amount of people who watch games on platforms such as Twitch is also going up.

Meeker warned that the worst elements of the internet will be amplified in the future, as removing problematic content becomes more difficult. The rise of toxic behavior, terrorists being radicalized on sites such as YouTube, and the political polarization on social media are highlighted as issues.

A couple of other interesting stats include the number of Echo devices installed in homes worldwide doubling to over 47 million, and between 2014 and 2018, the number of Americans using wearables also doubled.